


on a post-it note

by respoftw



Series: 35 Ways To Say I Love You In The Pegasus Galaxy [33]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Angst, Grief/Mourning, I'm Sorry, M/M, So much angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-05
Updated: 2016-11-05
Packaged: 2018-08-29 05:54:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8477797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/respoftw/pseuds/respoftw
Summary: It's all Rodney has left.





	

The post-it note is crinkled now from constant worrying, made worse by Carson's attempts to pry it out of his hand. There's a tear in the left hand corner, a tear that miraculously managed to avoid marring the words written on it. Rodney had screamed, desperate and broken, when the yellow paper started to split and that's the only reason that Carson stopped. Kate had yelled at him to stop.

Rodney had never heard Kate yell before.

Everyone left the room after that, leaving him alone with the yellow piece of paper that had already lost its adhesiveness.

Rodney feels a little bit like that himself. Like he's coming unstuck, losing whatever it is that keeps him tethered to reality.

It was John. It hadn't always been John but it had been John for so long that Rodney wasn't sure how to hold on without him.

The post-it note is all he has left of John now. His room had been cleared, his belongings sent back to Earth to be shunted off to some charity shop by a family that didn't even know him. The Cash poster had been left behind but Rodney had destroyed it in a fit of anger, ripping it apart like John had ripped him apart.

He wishes he hadn't done that.

He wishes a lot of things hadn't happened.

The yellow of the note is fading, the lights bleaching the colour out of it. He knows that he should keep it somewhere safe, keep it preserved, but that would mean letting it go, that would mean not being able to see it, not being able to run his thumb over the words inked on it. That would mean losing John all over again.

He shifts on the bed, leaning back until his head touches the wall and closes his eyes. Just for a second. He doesn't like to close his eyes for too long, doesn't like not having the note in his line of sight. It's all he has. If he takes his eyes off it for too long, it might disappear. Like John had.

The blinking red light of the security camera catches at the corner of his eye and Rodney knows that they're watching him, that they're all standing around in a worried circle discussing what to do with him.

They're going to send him back to Earth if he doesn't get better. If he doesn't sleep, if he doesn't eat. He doesn't care.

His home was John. He's already lost his home. Atlantis is as meaningless to him as Earth would be.

All that matters to him now is the post-it note. A yellow post it note pilfered from someone's stationery supplies and left stuck to his pillow, the one that had lost John's smell a week ago.

John had never been one for words, never been one to talk about his feelings. He was a man of action. Even if that action cost him his life.

Rodney should be grateful that he's got this much left. _Is_ grateful, when he's not busy being so angry with everybody and everything that he sees red.

A faded yellow post-it note, crinkled and torn, discoloured, shiny from the oil from Rodney's skin with three words scrawled on it.

Three words that are the only tangible evidence of John, of John and Rodney, that he had left.

_I love you._

It's not enough. It has to be enough. It will be enough.

 

**Author's Note:**

> ::ducks head:: I'm so sorry. Depressing as hell, I know, but sometimes that's what needs to be written. 
> 
> Just, I feel the need to clarify that Rodney's in a bad place at this point but that's it still early in the grieving process. He does get better, it always gets better. 
> 
> As always, you can find me on [Tumblr](http://buffycuddlespigs.tumblr.com) (Y'know, if you want to yell at me for this....)


End file.
